“At least you got calls,” he pointed out. “That’s not a bad thing.”
“Damned shit more than I got from my own mom.” His words came out bitter, harsher than he’d intended, but the sting of it all still hurt. They’d never been close. She worked, and well, he’d been an asshole of a kid, but Rafe’d always thought she’d be there if shit ever got real. He already blamed himself for Mark’s death. He hadn’t really needed his own mother to call him a murderer.
“Thought things were better now.”
“Better? Yeah, we talk. It’s hard, but I’m trying.” He shrugged. “I don’t know if she’s trying. I guess I’m still kind of pissed off that she wasn’t… there. Afterwards. I’m good enough to take a house and money from but not good enough to give the benefit of the doubt? That kind of shit stays with me.”
“And Brigid caring about you makes it worse?” Sionn grunted at Rafe’s nod. “Yeah, I can see that. Same thing with my da and them. There’s that moment when you stop asking ‘Why aren’t I good enough’ and start asking ‘Why aren’t you better than you are.’ Hardest thing in the world is finding out your parents are people.”
“That, and they have sex,” Rafe grumbled. “Brigid and Donal. That’s something I never needed to walk in on. Okay, Murphy. I’ll go to the Sunday thing. Just do me a favor.”
“I’m already not speaking to Damie about you. Isn’t that enough?”
“No. I want you to promise me that if it looks like Donal or Brigid have got me cornered, you’d come rescue me.”
“Just like the old days, then?”
“Yeah.” He grinned foolishly at Sionn. “Just like the old days.”
“And the answer to that, boyo, is also no.” Sionn patted Rafe’s cheek. “It’s time you grew up and fought your own battles on all fronts, Andrade. Just like the rest of us have.”
“WHAT THE fuck is that?” Rafe recoiled at the wrinkled green ball sac of a squash in Quinn’s hand. “Dude, put that down before it releases its tentacles and sucks the salt out of your body.”
Rafe’s aversion to all things vegetable was well known in the family, but Quinn liked poking at him for it all the same. “It’s bitter melon. Supposed to be good for you.”
“So’s shoving coffee up your colon, but I don’t do that either.” Rafe bared his teeth and took a step back.
That gave Quinn pause. “Really? People really do that?”
“Yep. Big thing in Los Angeles. Those people—” He waved a bunch of leeks under Quinn’s nose. “—are fucking crazy.”
Spread out over St. Patrick’s parking lot, the farmers’ market sat in the cathedral’s shade, a weekly sprawl of tables and tents set up by local agriculturists, craftsmen, bakers, and the occasional pickle maker. An olive briner did a brisk business next to a woman who made artisan breads, his flavored oils and vinegars poured out into disposable paper cups to use as dip for the warm, crusty pieces she handed out for samples.
Children darted in between adults, eating their way through the afternoon and probably spoiling their evening meal, but harried parents seemed to care less about what they ate so long as they were still in sight. A woman with three identical toddlers battled with one flopped onto the asphalt, its high-pitched caterwauling growing louder and louder despite its mother’s cajoling. A second later, another woman strode out from a fruit stand, scooped up the ill-behaved child without even stopping, then carried it off with a jaunty wave to her partner.
Quinn wasn’t sure whose sigh of relief was larger—the mother or Rafe’s.
“Do you like kids?” he ventured.
“In theory? Yes. In practice, haven’t had any,” Rafe said with a shrug. “Do Ian and Ryan count?”
“Sort of.” Quinn cocked his head, counting back the years. “You were around when Ryan was born, yes?”
“Yeah, Ian too.”
He dodged a little girl with a triple-decker ice cream cone, lifting his arms up over his head when it appeared she was heading straight for him. The girl careened to the side, drawn off by a gentle tug on her shirt by a gray-haired older woman following her.
“Braeden? I don’t think he was ever a kid. Your mom found him under a cabbage chewing up rocks and some shit like that. What about you? Kids?”
“To keep? Like a father? Or just in general?” A crackling fear iced down Quinn’s spine at the thought of a child looking to him for guidance. “My gut just now said no. I will go with my instincts and say no. Connor and Forest. They’re very paternal. They can have them.”
“I can see Connor showing up for parents’ assistance committees all SWATed up and wiping ketchup off of some petri-dished Morgan with big blue eyes and a black mop of hair.” Rafe shook his head. “Those husbands aren’t going to know what hit them when their wives go home and jump them. Probably think someone’s serving raw oysters and rhino-horn truffles at the bake-sale meetings. So no little Quinns?”